Who are you the past whispered? I wasn't sure. Born in Montreal to French - Irish parents and moved to America at age 4, I wasn't able to connect with my roots. The past whispered again and I began my search. The search for my elusive great-grandparents took me to County Cavan, Ireland, northern France and Belgium. The Past Whispers...

Montreal, QB Terrible Disaster At Picture Theatre, Jan 1927

ONE OF MOST POIGNANT TRAGEDIES IN HISTORY OF MONTREAL -- VICTIMS
RANGE FROM 5 TO 16 YEARS -- UNPARALLELED SCENES AS FRANTIC PARENTS
BESIEGE MORGUE SEEKING THEIR LOVED ONES.

Montreal, Jan. 10. -- The death of another youngster today brought
the number of casualties up to 77 in the Laurier Palace theatre fire and
panic here yesterday afternoon. Some thirty other children, who were
injured in the catastrophe, are now receiving treatment in hospitals.
The six bodies which remained unidentified up to a later hour last night
were claimed by the parents of the victims at the morgue today.
The six were: LAROTTE FRANCOEUR, 14; ARTHUR GASTON, 6; ROGER
PAGEAU, 14; ARTHUR GODON, 13; IDA GODIN, 10; and ARTHUR ST.
PIERRE, 13.

All of the victims have now been identified.

Montreal Surveys Scene of Havoc.
Montreal, Jan. 10. -- The citizens of Montreal this morning were
sorrowfully surveying the havoc wrought yesterday afternoon, when,
within a few brief minutes the lives of seventy-six children were
snuffed out and twenty-four other persons were more or less seriously
injured as the result of panic in the Laurier Palace moving picture
theatre which followed an alarm of fire. The little victims whose ages
ranged from five years to sixteen or seventeen were for the most part
suffocated by smoke or trampled to death under the feet of the throng
which jammed the exits in the wild rush to safety.

The tragedy is one of the most poignant that has ever occurred in this
city and is the greatest moving picture catastrophe that has happened in
this country. In several cases more than one member of the same family
was killed.

Constable ALBERT BOISSEAU of the Tetreaultville police station, lost three children.

Frantic Parents Besiege Morgue.

All yesterday afternoon and evening there was a heart rending procession
of distracted parents to the city morgue where the seventy-six little
bodies were laid out, awaiting identification. The scenes within the
building were unparalleled in their tragedy and in pathos as heartbroken
mother crushed with grief, came to seek and in too many instances to
claim some pitiful little corpse. Stricken to the depths with horror
and the sorrow of it all, the officials guided the mourning parents
among the bodies, themselves grim and unemotional as a rule,
breaking into tears at the sad and unprecedented spectacle. For hours an
endless line of fathers, mothers, sisters and brothers passed before
Coroner McMAHONE as the aged official, his head bowed in grief and his
heart filled with sympathy, assisted them to fulfill the requirements of
the law. Working ceaselessly and giving to each bereaved parent the
same kindly attention throughout the night, the coroner issued death
certificates after all identifications had been made and the cause of
death determined.

Many Children Not Attended.
To each parent, he put the question whether their dead child had gone to
the theatre attended by some responsible person and if he or she had
secured the parents permission. The answers in many cases were in the
negative.
How the fire, which was the cause of the catastrophe, began, will not be
determined until the inquest which begins today and until the owner of
the theatre, AMEEN LAWAND, a Syrian, has been questioned. LAWAND was
taken to the police station at an early hour this morning in company
with three others, the assistant manager, the head usher and the ticket
taker. He was granted $500 bail and will appear as a witness.

Children Stampede.

The fire started during the showing of a comedy picture. The theatre
was well filled, with children predominating. The fire was discovered
by an usher who took immediate steps to extinguish it while at the same
time counselling the audience to refrain from panic. The children,
however, became frightened and a wild rush was made for the exits.
Those who were seated in the balcony made a dash for the stairs, and it
was here that the disaster happened. At the end of the stairway, near
the bottom, only a few feet from the sidewalk, the children became
jammed. Dozens of them fell and were trampled under foot, their life
literally crushed out of them, while many more, fighting madly to get
out of the building, tried to push them from behind. The result was a
hopeless crush. So tightly was the mass jammed that even when
assistance in the shape of firemen and policemen arrived, it was found
impossible for twenty men, pulling on a rope attached to one of the
children to release him from the crush.

The Work Of Rescue.

Holes were made in the stairs underneath the mass and another in the
side wall of the building and through these many of the children were
dragged to safety.
While this was in progress the fire had been extinguished, but the
building was filled with smoke. Choking and gasping for breath, the
children were feverishly dragged out of the theatre, but in many cases
it was too late. The little people were brought out merely to
temporarily breathe in the cold fresh air, and then to fall back dead.
Ambulances, police patrols and taxicabs were pressed into service, the
taximen volunteering their assistance gratis and as the victims were
handed out they were rushed to the hospitals. The dead children were
taken to the morgue. Then began the sad search. Frantic parents, most
of whom resided in the vicinity of the theatre, rushed madly from the
place to the hospitals and from the hospitals to the morgue. In many
cases the visit to the hospital ended the search, but in many more the
search did not finish until the parents saw their childrens stretched
out dead.

Policeman Finds Own Three Kiddies.

Several of the firemen and policemen had their own children attending
the theatre and they worked feverishly to extricate the mass. Constable
BOISSEAU sought his three children, and the second sheet he turned up
on the sidewalk disclosed the features of one of them. His other two
had likewise perished.
Mayor MODERIC MARTIN last evening issued a message of condolence to the
bereaved parents and the Montreal Theatre Managers' association at once
opened a subscription which will swell from the original $10,000 aimed
at.

The theatre is in the Hochelaga district, in the east end of the city between Moreau street and Pie Ix boulevard.
The vast majority of the victims were French-Canadian children, although a few names are those of English-Canadians.